


Skillful sailing (that assures the prosperous voyage)

by dawnstruck



Series: Voyager [4]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Accidental Voyeurism, Bondage, M/M, Oral Sex, Prince!Keith, Rough Sex, Spanking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-11
Updated: 2017-02-11
Packaged: 2018-09-23 13:58:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,235
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9660290
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dawnstruck/pseuds/dawnstruck
Summary: So Shiro just grabs him, kisses him, cradles his face in his hands while the heels of his thumbs dig into the unprotected skin of Keith's neck. A little more pressure and he would be cutting off his airflow.“You will do as I say,” he growls against Keith's parted lips.Or, a change.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Forth part, finally from Shiro's POV which is why this somehow turned into 10k because that man thinks a lot during sex. 
> 
> I'd like to point out that I am initially using male pronouns for Pidge, just because it's before Shiro regognizes and remembers her as Katie. This is mostly meant as a marker that we are sort of moving along the canon timeline, even if I will not be delving into any plotpoints. This is surely an excuse to write some rather dirty sex and advance the relationship between Shiro and Keith.
> 
> Soundtrack: “Drugs” by Eden & “Treat You Better” by Shawn Mendes

“ **It is not the ship so much as skillful sailing that assures the prosperous voyage.”**

**George William Curtis**

* * *

 

The door swishes open in front of Shiro and he steps over the threshold for the second time in an hour. The cabin looks just like his own, only situated a little further down the hall away from the others. It's mostly because the other paladins were still leery about the presence of Zarkon's son in the midst instead of in the cells, but it also had the added benefit of offering a little more privacy. Shiro has no intention of finding out how soundproof these walls actually are.  
He's been caught in the act once and he does not care for a repeat performance. Exhibitionism was not among his interests. Yet.

On the bed in the alcove, Keith awaits. By now his arms must surely have grown numb, fastened behind his back and with his full weight resting on them. His wrists are tied with the silken sash Shiro had previously used to gag him, just before his escape from the Galran ship. When he had fled, he had taken it with him, a guilty memento.

Now he has bound Keith with it and left him with the instructions to not touch himself. The Galra could have easily freed himself, of course, so to see now that he had actually obeyed instead of just rubbing himself off on the sheets sends a please hum up along Shiro's spine.

When he steps closer, Keith willingly lets his legs fall open and instinctively Shiro's gaze drops down to his cock. He is still fully hard and has been for a while now. Shiro had already taken him to the edge once before, had fucked him slow and not let him come, had left him dangling there, only to return now with Keith wet, fucked out and gaping.

“You waited,” Shiro says, mild praise in his voice, and Keith only blinks back languidly, no other reply forthcoming.

Shiro kneels down on the bed, between Keith's legs, and puts his hands to the bony hips. With one quick pull, he drags him across the mattress and hitches him up, so the cleft of Keith's ass is flush with Shiro's hardening cock.

Keith braces his feet against the bed and rubs up against him.

“Patience,” Shiro tells him.

“Kuro,” Keith complains as though that fake name were the last vestige of his resistance.

It's a familiar sentiment. The young prince likes to put up a fight before his eventual surrender. It reads like pride but, if someone cares to look deeper, it's mostly the wish to couple violation with actual violence.

And Shiro, from experience, knows how to provide.

He does not remember much of his lost year, just has fragments and what little scraps Keith throws at him now and then, more feelings and impressions than anything coherent. Shiro worries over them, wonders whether he should try and sew them into a bigger picture, into something that makes even a lick of sense, but a part of him still does not dare, hopes to preserve the last bit of innocence he has left.

In a way, this is still cathartic to him.

Back when he had be a prisoner, dominating Keith had been a welcome outlet, a violent fantasy he allowed himself to act on. There had been a certain kind of vindication in being a slave to the Galra's amusement while at the same time having their prince spread for him so willingly. An additional rush of adrenaline running through him whenever he looked up from his place in the arena and up to the gallery, knowing that he would have Keith moaning underneath him a little while later if only he won.

Shiro always won.

The envious whispers of those who called him the prince's champion followed him whenever he was let out of his cell. For months, Shiro was only allowed to leave the prison bay whenever he was wanted for fighting or for fucking, and he knew which scenario he preferred.

So this is how he finds himself here again, now doubtlessly of his own volition, and he still finds a particular kind of freedom in it.

He pulls his erect cock from the confines of his pants and lines himself up. Keith's hole twitches in anticipation and his chin tilts back. Then Shiro pushes in.

It's not as tight as the first time he did it today and even then it had only been after half an hour of preparing Keith with his fingers, but it's still indescribably good. Keith immediately clenches down around him, hoping for more friction, but Shiro's hands are quick to return to his hips, not giving him the chance to move.

With a calculated roll of his own hips, he pulls put and pushes back in. The angle is perfect in that it has Keith sing in reaction while never quite being enough. It's the same spiel Shiro had used before and he sees no reason to abandon it so soon.

Sometimes, he wonders at how easily he adapted to Keith's expectations of him. Back on Earth, he had had little leisure for dating, always too busy with his coursework at the Garrison and preferring to evenly divide his free time among his friends. He's had sex, of course, but those encounters were always nice and quiet affairs, and while it hadn't exactly been strictly missionary it had still been decidedly vanilla.

Vanilla with Keith, on the other hand, means that he does not choke him to oblivion.

They very rarely do vanilla.

Shiro cannot quite pinpoint whether it was merely the erosion of his mental stability caused by the Galra that had made him so willing to chance his ways, or whether it was wholly Keith's incentive. In any case, Shiro knows that he fucks differently now.

Shame is a distant concept to him while his ideals of consent have twisted. Shiro never has to ask whether he is allowed to touch Keith is certain way, but Keith will bitch at him whenever it doesn't hurt enough.

He does not know whether all Galra fuck in this manner, but he doubts it. Keith would have little reason to come to him if that were the case.

While in captivity he had grown to loathe his body, the bulging muscles and the skin torn apart under teeth and claws and blades. He had no mirror, could only jigsaw puzzle his face into a mishmash of outdated memories and new suspicious. The graying hair flopping across his forehead. The uneven scar running across his face, felt underneath callous fingers. Worst of all, of course, was the alien arm they attached to him, fused into his bones as though it had always been part of himself.

So Shiro hated it, hated it with a passion, but still knew that it was better than being left a cripple.

His body was a temple, in ruins, and all its gods long fled, but Shiro still depended on it to ensure his survival. His strength allowed him to make it out of the arena again and again. His strength caught the prince's interest.

Bizarrely, he had quickly gotten used to Keith hungrily biting at his scar, running his sharp nails along them in close fascination. In the beginning, though, none of it had made sense.

When Keith had first come to him, Shiro hadn't known what to expect, had kept himself guarded and monosyllabic as he tolerated Keith's eyes on him. He had thought the prince, like his older brother was known to do, liked to test the limits, liked to goad others until they snapped and gave him an excuse to dispose of them, a capricious child's game.

Keith, however, played by different rules.

Even now, there is a power imbalance between them. Even now, Shiro does not care.

His body has an awareness now that he used to lack, honed from fighting and the higher level of gravity on the Galran ship. He knows he moves differently, more deliberately, does not hesitate to take up a lot of room. You did not survive by tiptoeing through life.

Slowly, he drags his cock out of Keith so that it catches on the rim. Watches. Waits. Then he pushes back in, repeats the progress.

Patience yields focus and he can revel in it, can control his urges because he is in control at all times. It's why he is even able to do this. If feels safe, secure. If there were even a single moment in which he felt losing that same control slipping, he knows he would white out with panic.

Keith, however, gets off on the loss of it, or at least the pretense of loss. He cannot make Shiro do anything, can only endure whatever treatment he sees fit to bestow on him. Sometimes he does things that will leave black bruises on Keith's skin, and sometimes he drives him to insanity with other means.

The head of his cock grazes Keith's prostate, but not enough to bring anything close to satisfaction.

Keith positively sobs in frustration, his gaze feverish, his cheeks flushed. But he looks so _alive_.

“Please,” he whines and it's rare that he begs, rarer still that he does it so early. Then again, he had been waiting for this for a while.

“Please what?” Shiro demands because he does not give in so easily. Keith would not want him to.

Keith's eyebrows furrow and his mouth curls up unhappily but he does not reply.

Shiro pulls out of him. And stays there, unmoved.

At once, Keith begins to squirm, looking to be filled again, but he must know it's a futile attempt.

“Please what?” Shiro repeats, letting his thumb run over the aching rim without actually penetrating. Keith shudders.

“Please fuck me,” he grits out, pushing his head back into the mattress and glaring up at the ceiling.

“I was doing that before,” Shiro reminds him, “You didn't seem to really approve of that either.”

“Fuck me hard,” Keith says, “Please, just- _use_ me, I need, I need-”

“This?” Shiro asks and roughly shoves his cock back in. Keith cuts off with a surprised choke, slipping farther up the bed, but Shiro just pulls him back once more.

“Yes,” Keith's says, both in answer to the question and as an overarching sentiment, “Yes.”

So Shiro complies. The thing with teasing is that you are always teasing yourself as well. When he had left Keith here, he had sat in his own cabin and waited for his erection to go down, eventually just taking a cold shower, but still finding himself restless and on edge. But in the end, the noises spilling out of Keith's mouth now made it worth it.

He thrusts into Keith, again and again, neatly lifting his hips off the bed and maneuvering him as he sees fit. Keith, his back arched, hair splayed against the sheets in a tangled mess, can only let it happen.

Shiro can feel the tightness in his own belly unfurling, but he does not permit it yet, instead bracing down and fucking Keith in a short staccato rhythm, his fingertips digging into the flesh of his ass.

“A-ah,” Keith's eyes have flown open, wide but unseeing as though he had been taken to another world were things were easier, clearer. Shiro jackknifes forward and Keith comes, untouched, overstimulated.

His moan vibrates against the walls like an ancient prayer in a cathedral, seems to hang in the air for a moment, while his ass clenches around Shiro, begging him to join.

Shiro grunts, stiffens, stills as orgasm hits him hard. The heat in his belly expands, extrapolates, consumes him from inside out, and his essence spills in strong bursts.

He lets his head hang, shoulder blades angled, and just tries to hold on to the harsh bliss of the moment. Then Keith begins to struggle. He sits up, pulling himself free from Shiro's grasp and his cock, and then he neatly twists out of the sash still bound around his wrists. He flexes his arms a little, massages feeling back into them. Then he flops back down onto the bed, pulling a pillow close.

The dismissal is obvious. For today, their game is over.

“Leave,” Keith says anyway, as though to make sure the simple-minded human understood.

Shiro bites his tongue, a sour taste in his mouth.

“I don't understand you,” he says, too much honesty bleeding into his voice.

“I don't need you to understand me,” Keith replies easily and turns his back to him.

 

Tying Keith up in his room is one thing, giving him free rein over a lion of Voltron another.

The team has reluctantly allowed for Keith to join their ranks but that does not mean that they are comfortable with him being there.

There had formed Voltron once, in the midst of battle, when they were fighting on opposing fronts. Yet now, on a regular practice run when they are supposed to learn to view each other as peers, they completely fail to do the same.

Under Coran and Allura's well-meaning but similarly clueless advice, they try to combine their five lions into one knight in literally shining armor, one attempt more harebrained than the next. Shiro can feel his frustration growing and it is not exactly conductive to improving the situation, but the real problem is unpleasantly obvious.

Among their valiant effort to join their conscious and operate as one being, Keith's resistance sits obvious and obstinate at their center.

Finally, they land their lions and a cacophony of voices bursts through the comm, complaints and accusations and downright petulance because none of them felt like they were at fault.

“Everyone, shut up,” Shiro orders. He dislikes the role of the leader but in moments such as these it at least gives him some modicum of gratification.

“Keith,” he adds more pointedly, “You are totally out of sync.”

“It's not my fault you are all crappy pilots,” Keith sasses back. And he isn't wrong but, while Shiro and Lance at least have experience with piloting, none of them are fighting class. Keith is the only soldier among them and he cannot expect the same expertise of the rest of the them.

“This is a team effort,” Shiro reminds him for the sixth time, “A chain is only as strong as its weakest link.”

“That's why teamwork does not work in war,” Keith points out, as though Zarkon had conquered galaxies as a one-man show, and – after hours of futility – Shiro has had enough.

He pulls his helmet off his head, tosses it into his seat as he pushes up and off. Instead of having the Black Lion lower her head and open her maw to let him out, he climbs up the ladder rungs in the cockpit and opens the hatch that leads to the top of her skull.

The Red Lion is parked right next to him, his right arm, his sword arm, in theory, slightly smaller than Black, but Shiro imagines an almost arrogant tilt to her nose, the same that Keith seems to carry at all times.

Keith, probably in anticipation of Shiro's patience finally running out, is already climbing out of the cockpit as well. In the lashing wind, his hair whips around him, pushing and pulling as he himself stands strong.

With a leap fueled by aggression, Shiro launches himself across the distance between them and heavily lands on Red's smooth skull. His knees protest against the impact, but he is already straightening up again and taking another brisk step forward until he is standing directly in front of Keith.

They face off, glaring, and everything around them seems very far away.  
There is no one else in their minds now, the connection to the other paladins diminished as soon as they left their lions, but somehow Keith still manages to be a smug, ill-fitting presence right in Shiro's core.

He wonders whether it's the same for Keith, whether when he looks at Shiro he sometimes wants to dig deep into himself and tear out the parts that have been touched, maybe even tainted in such an intimate fashion. But asking that question would admit too much vulnerability.

So instead Shiro just grabs him, kisses him, cradles his face in his hands while the heels of his thumbs dig into the unprotected skin of Keith's neck. A little more pressure and he would be cutting off his airflow.

“You will do as I say,” he growls against Keith's parted lips.

When he pulls back, Keith's eyes are heavy-lidded and just slightly unfocused. Shiro, with a small surge of surprise, realizes that this is different from the expression he wore before, the one that spoke of petty belligerence. Instead this is the open, malleable look that Keith never quite managed to conceal whenever he gave Shiro permission to hurt him.

After just one violent kiss, Keith is moments away from being blissed out and that makes Shiro understand that, right now, he could make him do almost anything. So he does.

“Get back into your lion,” he says and, for good measure, licks across Keith's mouth once more.

Keith gives a sharp, sudden inhale. And a small, silent nod.

 

They form Voltron.

With Keith's stubbornness smoothed down into still vaguely clunky compliance, the lions' seams fuse together as though they had never been apart.

For a moment, there is nothing but stunned silence across the comm.

“Wow,” Hunk says, “All that trouble and then it turns out that you guys could have just smooched it out from the beginning.”

“I am torn between being impressed that this worked and wanting to tell Shiro to please never do anything like that in front of my poor eyes again,” Lance says, sounding very much put out.

“Virgin,” Keith scoffs with little bite but Lance lets out an indignant squawk anyway. Hunk is making retching noises again and Pidge snickers quietly.

Shiro sighs and lets his head sink against the backrest of his seat.

 

All of them, though some more vehemently than others, agree that Keith and Shiro – or Keith and everyone else really – having to settle their differences before each battle, is no way to win a war, so Coran luckily comes up with an alternative solution.

Mediation is something Shiro is good at. He had first gotten into it back at the Garrison when his coursework threatened to get the better of him and he needed some sort of outlet for his stress. Then, during the months of captivity, it had been something to keep him grounded, keep him centered. Keep him sane.

This, Coran argues, will be a good exercise for them to bond, to allow their minds to run on the same wavelength and operate in tune. Voltron, he said, was all about synergy. If even one of them was off-key, the rest of them would end up in disarray as well, and then everything would fall apart.

“Focus on your lions,” Coran instructs them as they settle down in a circle, “Your lions are your fixpoints. But be aware of each other, too. You have to strengthen the invisible ties that bind you.”

Unbidden, an image of Keith spread out in front of him invades Shiro's mind, of Keith tied up and shackled and _bound_. He squishes it down as quickly as it had come, instead calling up other, older, memories.

He thinks of his hometown, of the waves gently lapping against the shore, the endless blue and the salt in the air. He had missed it in the desert and even more so up in space, but the memory had always calmed him. There was something unpredictable and deep about the ocean that he had grown up not fearing but respecting. The seas were almost as unknown as the stars but the ocean still spelled safety to Shiro. He sinks of the Garrison and its monochrome simplicity, of his friends and their envisioned futures, of the red sunset on the horizon. And he thinks of the Black Lion, new to him still, but familiar, too, as though they had known each other for eons already, as though they were meant to be. He thinks of Fate and and a little bit of revenge, too, but her presence in his mind is soothing, almost maternal in how natural it feels. When he had greeted her first, she had welcomed him without suspicion or guile. She had known him and he had known her.

When he reaches out to the others, however, Shiro can tell that they are having more trouble establishing the connections to their lions when they are separated.

Lance, though he and Blue seemed to be the closest of the bunch, is distracted by his big family, with him right in the middle of it, loved and pampered and dearly missed. Pidge, too, is holding on to the idea of his girlfriend, no, his sister, no, his sibling, to the cutting pain of loss and separation. Hunk remembers cooking with his grandmother and going out to eat with his friends and sneaking into the Garrison kitchen with Lance to whip up some midnight snack, the kind of food that will forever make the Altean goo unbearable, and the mouth-watering smell wafts across their bond.

Keith- Keith feels heat and hurt and hard breath, panted against the bite marks on his neck, the twofold ache between his legs, the push, the slide of the sheets against his bare back, the ceiling above and - when he dares to open his eyes just so – at his periphery the glint of where Kuro's metal arm transitions into scarred skin-

“Ugh, gross, man,” Lance gags and then the moment is over, everyone losing the tentative tether they had tried to tie to their lions.

“That was way tmi,” Hunk agrees, “I feel violated.”

If only they knew, Shiro thinks. If only they knew the true extent of how far he and Keith had dared to take things. The times Shiro had gotten high on the thrill, on the knowledge that if only he pressed down a little harder he could break Keith's bones, crush his lungs.

Those thoughts had scared him in an immediate and intimate fashion, because he knew death, he knew killing, and it was not something he ever enjoyed. Not when it was real. But Keith had allowed him to make a game of it, a perverse, madding game that Shiro could never quite stop playing. A game he doesn't think can be won.

The other three are all throwing Keith thinly veiled looks of disgust now. Hunk's appetite has completely disappeared, Lance does not seem willing to taint the memory of his family with this moment, and Pidge in particular seems agitated, as though Keith's mere existence were an insult.

Keith himself is simply glaring at the ground, not looking at any of them. He has closed himself off again, has reclaimed what little of himself he had surrendered before, and it's best to move on quickly before the front lines can harden once more.

“Alright,” Shiro says, his voice raised to get their attention, “Let's all settle down and try this again.”

“You know what?” Lance says, “ _No_. I'm not doing it. Prince Pornstar here isn't even trying. And he's actively preventing us from succeeding by projecting these- these- well, _that_ just to make us uncomfortable and lose focus.”

“That's not-,” Keith tries to object but is shot down.

“Oh sure,” Lance scoffs, “You're telling me it's oh so difficult to think of literally anything else but of you taking it up the-”

Keith jumps up so quickly that Shiro's hand automatically reaches for a weapon that isn't there. They can't risk any infighting, not when they are already failing at being a team, and Lance would not stand a chance against Keith.

But he needn't have worried. Instead of immediately going in for an attack, Keith is stalking towards the door and then out of the room with large hurried steps.

“Good riddance,” Lance mutters, crossing his arms in front of his chest, but even he seems surprised by the silent retreat.

Shiro lets out a big put-upon sigh, forcing himself to feel more annoyed than embarrassed. Because now all the paladins know the ghost of what it feels like to be fucked by him, but only Keith knows the real thing, and only Shiro himself knows what it's like to have Keith on his back and panting.

There had been more to it than that, though. More than just the arousal and addiction that Shiro had always assumed to be the primary motivator between their inadvisable hookups. And that, in itself, raises another important question. Because Lance was right about one thing.

Why would a Galran prince's most calming memory be of being fucked raw by a near stranger, by a prisoner, by a slave? Didn't he have anything else to center himself around? Or had he just been unwilling to share anything he actually deemed personal?

But no. The scene they had all just accidentally witnessed had been personal in more ways than just one. Yes, it was sex, but Keith had shown no shame about that before. This hadn't even been one of their more adventurous encounters, one where Shiro closed his hand around Keith's fragile neck and squeezed until his eyes rolled back in his head, where he called him names that kind of made him want to wash out his mouth with soap while also making them both surge with the wrongness of it all, with the taboo and the reverse in power.

Instead, Shiro realizes that Keith's memory had been of their sole fuck that could be considered something like gentle. Their second-to-last one before his escape. The one where Keith had suddenly sounded panicked and pushed him away, only to change his mind and pull him back in. The one where Shiro had taken him on his back, as much of their naked skin touching as they could possibly manage, sweat gathering between their bodies and Shiro licking it off of his collarbone.

“Soo, is this session over?” Hunk asks, jerking Shiro from his thoughts.

“I- yes,” Shiro allows, because there is nothing else they can do right now. Not when even he finds himself tragically unsettled.

“Oh thank God!” Lance exclaims, immediately jumping to his feet, “I need to wash out my eyes with bleach.”

“I think you need to do your whole brain,” Pidge gripes.

“Good idea, actually,” Lance agrees, “If that doesn't work, I'll have to go straight for the lobotomy.”

It was just sex, Shiro thinks to himself, trudging up the energy to feel somewhat offended. Good, satisfying, even if morally somewhat dubious sex.

But, he admits to himself, it really had always been a little more than that.

 

Time, in space, passes slowly and then all at once.

Some days drag on and there is little to do and then some emergency happens, some planet is threatened, and they have to live up to the lions' legacy.

Their teamwork is still more of a hiccup, coming in sudden bursts whenever one least expects it. For now, it's alright, though, because in crucial moments they turn like the cogs in a well-oiled clockwork.

Quickly, Keith proves himself to be an invaluable asset. He is a brilliant pilot, more instinctual than indoctrinated, and if they truly would have faced him in battle he would have been a fearsome opponent. As it is, though, he blithely ignores orders, weaves himself through stars and skies, and occasionally saves the day in his own bristly manner.

He seems to be doing it less out of the goodness of his heart, wanting to help the paladins and save other planets, and more out of an inherent intent to fuck over Zarkon in whatever manner possible.

If Voltron's reputation grows, so does Galra's fear of them. And fear fostered follies.

Keith also liberally discloses well-kept secrets regarding the inner workings of Zarkon's system. He speaks of Haggar, of quintessence, of the rumors regarding a resistance within the ranks.

The rest of the team receives the information with some healthy suspicion because it just seems too good to be true, too convenient. Whenever they don't believe him, Keith just shrugs, shows no signs of being upset for whatever reason. It is nigh on impossible to figure out what's going on inside his head.

Rebel without a cause, Shiro thinks, but even that does not feel right.

When they are not on the battlefield, Keith fends for himself, in the most literal sense. He does not seek out the company of the others, just asks for permission to be locked in on the training deck so that he may spar with the bots.

One day, when Shiro joins him on the deck, Keith does not even look up, just launches himself at another dummy, knocking it over with a well-placed kick before turning to the next opponent.

Shiro, watching from the sidelines, finds himself impressed. He had known Keith was a excellent fighter, had known it to be the prince's reputation and had witnessed it when they were fighting side by side. But this is the first time Shiro truly has the leisure to appreciate that fact.

Keith, possibly due to his smaller build, has developed a style that is quite different from that of most Galra. It's almost more of a dance, not necessarily the most efficient in terms of stamina, but his agility and strength easily make up for it.

He also fights dirty, uses everything at his disposal to ensure his victory. He snaps elbows into chrome faces, trips up his opponents with long legs, runs up along the wall to then descend onto his victims.

He is no spoiled prince, that much is obvious, and Shiro can feel himself growing aroused at the thought of that. It was tantalizing to know that, during their encounters, Keith could easily fought him off at any given moment. That he let Shiro win anyway, a fake champion.

When he steps forward, neither he nor Keith are surprised by his words.

“I want you to fight me,” he says into the space between them, “Properly. Don't hold back.”

He wants to know. He has to. And, judging by the glint of excitement in Keith's eyes, he feels the same.

“Fine,” Keith says, swiping the hair out of his face, “Choose your weapon.”

“No weapons,” Shiro says because that is not their thing. Keith had used his knife on him that first time, but other than that they had only ever needed their bodies.

“Fine,” Keith says again, as though he does not care either way. Then he attacks.

Shiro does not know how long they are sparring. He is slower than Keith but also more enduring. Their strength, however, seems evenly matched. Then again, Keith had already been training for a while before Shiro showed up.

There's a single-mindedness to fighting, especially when you are not fighting for your life. There is something clean about it as everything else falls away around you, time and space only relevant in context of how quickly you needed to react, where you ought to put your foot.

Under great duress, Shiro finally manages to overwhelm Keith, to wrestle him down onto the floor mats and keep him there. Keith, however, does not yield easily, instead simply starting to bite at Shiro's flesh wrist. He does not draw blood, seems to do it more to prove a point than to actually free himself, and Shiro feels a small trickle of amusement sink into him.

“I win,” he says and Keith's glares up at him.

They both know, though. Know that whenever Shiro had won in the arena, Keith had given him a reward. There is no reason why it should be any different now.

Keith licks across the rapid pulse in Shiro's wrist and then relaxes on the floor.

“I yield,” he says, a small souvenir of spite, and bares his throat.

It's like this that Pidge eventually finds them, lying on the floor and kissing and biting and with too little discretion. It's better than when everyone had seen Keith with Shiro's cum between his thighs, but it's still bad. Especially since Pidge, who due to Matt and Samuel's abduction, has a particular dislike of the Galra, more so than Hunk and Lance.

“Dinner is ready,” Pidge says darkly. Her lips twitch as though she wants to say more, but stops herself at the last moment.

“We'll be there,” Shiro promises, though he does not bother rolling off of Keith just yet.

 

Dinner, at first, is a bit of an awkward affair and Shiro suspects that Pidge must have let something slip. Lance especially looks somewhat terse, but Hunk and Coran make an effort to talk about the food. It goes well until Keith joins in.

“Say what you will,” he scoffs, dipping his spoon into the green goo, “But Galran cuisine is definitely better.”

Coran flounders a little at the offense, but Shiro secretly has to agree with Keith. Even before he had been champion, the meals the prisoners were given had been much better than the bland Altean goo, no matter how nutritious and digestible Coran claimed it to be.

“For a prince maybe,” Lance says, making a point of heartily digging into his own portion, “I bet you were served five course meals every day.”

Keith sends him a wayward glare, but does not bother with replying.

“We used to host the grandest of feasts at the palace,” Allura says wistfully, “We'd have masquerades and carnivals, with floating lanterns and musicians and everybody dancing.”

“Oh, you were such a delight whenever you danced the Helcafiz,” Coran remembers, his eyes lighting up, “I ought to get out my old Venerian harp and play a few jigs. Maybe you could teach the others the steps, Princess. We mustn't let our culture be forgotten.”

The genocide of their people is still a sore topic and will forever remain so, but both Allura and Coran seem intent of holding on to what little they have left.

“I, for one, would love to dance with you, my princess,” Lance says smoothly, wiggling his eyebrows across the table.

“Lance is an amazing dancer,” Hunk agrees.

“I have two left feet,” Pidge grumbles.

“Oh,” Coran says, as though something had just occurred to him, and he turns toward Keith, “Are they still dancing the Kazkan on Galra? I used to be quite good at it, when I was a youth.”

“The Kazkan is a dance performed only by members of royal families,” Allura explains for the benefit of the others, “Children learn it at a very young age. It is more of a dance with blades and therefore requires a high degree of skill.”

Shiro does not think that children plus weapons sounds like a good idea, but he can see it being right up Keith's alley.

“They danced it at my inauguration,” Keith allows, but for some reason he is furiously staring down at his plate, at though the goo were suddenly appealing to him after all.

“Marvelous,” Coran nods, twirling his mustache between his fingertips, “When we were still allies, King Alfor and Zarkon used to dance the Kazkan at official functions, as a mutual sign of trust and respect. Maybe you and the princess could-”

“I never learned how to dance it,” Keith cuts him off, “So no.”

And with that the conversation is over.

 

Shiro does not dwell on it. There are many other things to worry about, after all, and Keith's lack of a dance education is not among them.

He is a paladin, but he is also their prisoner and they still lock him into his cabin at night. Keith himself does not seem to care either way. He performs his duties, has their back during battles, and does not complain about his treatment.

Coran, however, possibly because he still remembers a time before the war, seems adamant about getting Keith to open up to them, if only so their bond as Voltron will strengthen.

“Traditional Galran robes,” Coran explains graciously when he presents Keith with an attire of deep purpure cloth, “From when our relations were better.”

It's a peace offering and genuine one at that. Keith does not seem to care much for it.

With pinched fingers, he plucks at the fabric, inspecting it as though from a safe distance. Then he gives a derisive snort.

“Those are so old fashioned.”

“Yet befitting a son of noble birth,” Coran points out, not offended in the slightest. He must have known that it would take a little more effort to wear away at Keith's rough shell.

“I am a bastard,” Keith replies, clearly fed up, “Zarkon only legitimized me a little while ago. Until recently I was nothing but a fighter pilot and before that a foot soldier. I know nothing of your dances and your revelries. I know you all think of me as Lotor II., but I like to think that I'm a little more complex than that.”

Coran makes a surprised sound high in his throat and then darts a questioning look at Shiro. Shiro, however, can only shrug because... he had not known that either.

Yes, the rumor mill of the Galran ship had informed him that Keith was a bastard and a half-breed to boot. And although he couldn't have been sure but by the sound of his name he had already wondered whether it was possible for the Galran prince to have a human mother. Laying eyes on him for the first time had only hardened that suspicion. Keith was slight for a Galra, finely boned, while even most Galran women were grotesque in their size.

The things about Keith that had always seemed to scream royalty - the controlled facial expressions, the dangerous grace, the devil-may-care attitude - now make even more sense in the context of him being an expandable soldier, a survivor, a solitude-seeker.

Some other things, though, do not make any sense at all.

 

That night, Shiro goes to Keith's cabin and lets himself in. It's a sick reversal of their time on the Galran ship, only that there are no guards flanking the door when Shiro opens it.

He finds Keith lounging on the bed, obviously bored. They should at least give him something to read, to entertain himself with. Shiro is intimately familiar with how it is the ennui and isolation that drives you mad, more so than any other sort of torture, until fighting in the arena had almost become a welcome distraction.

Keith must be thinking something similar because he is already rolling over and onto his knees, watching Shiro expectantly.

And Shiro, Shiro is hard in his pants, has been since he first made up his mind to come here. They are like conditioned dogs, both of them, well-trained and salivating at the merest stimulation.

With slow measured steps, he crosses the cabin and comes to a stop in front of the bed. He doesn't say anything, just reaches out and gathers Keith's thick hair in one hand, moves his head around like this, watches his collarbone and the tendons in his necks shift accordingly.

Keith's eyes are hooded, his breathing growing more labored, even though they have barely even touched. There is no doubt that he wants this.

With his other hand, Shiro frees himself from the confines of his pants, stroking himself a couple of times until he is fully erect. Then he steps closer still, angles his cock so that it is pointed at Keith's mouth and pulls him in.

Keith's lips part like a budding rose would open its petals, somewhat coquettish, but with a certain inevitability to it. His tongue is wet as it laps at Shiro before fulling taking him in.

Shiro bites down on the inside of his cheek to stifle a low groan. He'd been thinking of this ever since he saw Keith's meditation memory, and now his fantasy finally comes to fruition.

Keith's eyes have fallen shut in something between bliss and concentration. He does not use his hands, idly leaves them sitting in his lap, though one of his fingers is caressing the outline of his own growing erection, almost as an afterthought, as though Shiro's enjoyment came first. As though the whole point of this was that giving Shiro pleasure gave Keith pleasure.

Shiro, his fingers still in Keith's hair, just moves his head back and forth. He does not actually fuck his face, keeping his own hips still, instead letting Keith work for it. Keith hollows his cheeks, works up spit as his tongue runs along the underside of Shiro's cock, tracing the thick vein there, before lapping across the head, dipping into the slit, then giving a harsh suck.

He does this several times, with the ease of habit guiding his movements. Then, he flickers his eyes open and looks straight up at Shiro.

Shiro, enthralled, tightens his grip, clenches his jaw and comes in Keith's mouth. Keith's throat closes up momentarily and his nostrils flare, but then he is swallowing, almost greedily. Shiro pulls out, still half-hard, and some of the cum lands on Keith's cheek, slides down to his chin. He should look disgruntled, undignified, but instead that heaviness in his gaze still lingers and he artlessly sprawls back against the wall.

But Shiro is not done yet. Putting one knee onto the mattress, he goes for Keith's clothes, wrestling them off him. Keith, his movements slightly lethargic, does not resist, dutifully lifts his hips as his pants are slipped down his legs. His knees splay open, exposing himself, and the vaguely hopeful look on his face makes it obvious what he is asking for.

Shiro reaches out, scoops the leftover cum off Keith's cheek and efficiently coats his fingers with it. Then he fucks them right into Keith. The corners of Keith's mouth jump at the sudden invasion, the friction, but he does not say anything, merely digs his claws into the sheets.

Shiro's other hand closes around Keith's straining erection which had been completely neglected so far, and the effect is immediate. Keith's hips jump and his head falls back. Within seconds, he is panting and his hair sticks to his sweat-damp forehead. Like this, he looks positively debauched and Shiro's eyes try to stay trained on his face before they inevitably drop down to where his fingers are disappearing into Keith again and again.

He keeps it slow, though, draws it out, till Keith eventually grows impatient.

“C'mon,” he growls, “Hurt me.”

The words make Shiro still, which in turn makes Keith groan in frustration.

“I don't want to hurt you,” Shiro says after a deliberate moment.

A furrow appears between Keith's eyebrows.

“I don't care want you want,” he retorts, meaningfully pushing back onto Shiro's fingers.

“And I don't care for your attitude,” Shiro tells him, keeping his tone decisive, “From now on, we're doing this my way.”

Immediately, Keith's foot comes up and presses against Shiro's chest, shoving him away until his fingers slip free. Then Keith has scrambled back up onto his haunches, a vicious glare claiming his features.

“So what you are saying is that, instead of acting like you're raping me when I want it, you're going to actually rape me when I don't,” he summarizes, completely turning their entire conversation upside down.

The words, even more so than the pure venom of his tone, are unpleasant. So far, Shiro had skirted around the acknowledgment of that, of that idea of rape. He knows that it's what it must look like from the outside, knew it even before the others had found him fucking Keith in the prison cells. But so far everything between them had been consensual, even if they had never directly spoken about it. Only now Keith was implying that it might no longer be.

For a long moment Shiro just looks at him, contemplates his options. In the end, he surprises himself.

“Why did you let me escape, Keith?” he asks. His voice is calm, almost serene. He's not sure where it comes from. But it's a question that has been on his mind for a long time now, one he had been mulling over since the original truth had first been revealed to him. Yet Keith, predictably, just turns his head away. But Shiro is now cowed.

“Was it to spite Lotor or Zarkon?” he wants to know, “Were you hoping I would get caught and punished? Were you secretly part of the resistance? Or was it something else?”

Keith's lips twitch up like the flews of a dog just before a snarl. “Why do you want answers so badly?”

“Because I need to know whether I can trust you,” Shiro says.

“You can't.”

Short, harsh, distancing. Shiro will not let himself be kept at arm's length any longer.

He leans in, all the way across the mattress, touches two fingers to Keith's chin, touches his lips to Keith's mouth, and kisses him.

“But I want to,” he admits.

Keith just blinks at him, possibly too stunned to show a more violent reaction.

“ _Why_?” he asks in utter bewilderment.

“Because we were there for each other when we needed someone”, Shiro explains, “We can be that again, but better.”

That at least startled an aborted laugh out of Keith. “Do you know how deranged you sound? What would your little friends say?”

“My friends haven't lived through what I have,” Shiro knows, “They don't understand the importance of an ally in enemy territory. And to be honest... I barely know any of them.”

Being thrown into life-or-death situations has the benefit of immediately forging incredible friendships that are based on mutual trust and dependence and, even beyond that, Shiro had doubtlessly grown fond of the rest of Team Voltron.

And yet. Hunk and Lance and Pidge merely knew him in name and face and reputation, in the way instructors had talked about him at Garrison, how his picture must have flickered across the screen when the Kerberos crew was announced lost. Allura and Coran, on the other hand, knew him from prophecy and intuition, more wishful thinking than anything else, even if he tried his best to live up to their hopes.

But Keith. Keith has known him for months, knows the parts of him that are dark and gritty. Keith knows what Shiro has done to ensure his survival, time and time again. Keith knows that Shiro comes especially hard when Keith is seizing from strangulation.

“Is that what I am to you?” Keith asks, “An ally?” For some reason, he looks strangely calm now, strangely collected. Shiro frowns mildly.

“Is there something else you'd like to be?” he wonders, almost teasingly. At once, Keith's face shutters again.

“... We are talking in circles,” he notes, as though he just wants this conversation to be over already, but in a different way from how Shiro wants that, too.

“So just give me a straight answer.”

For a long moment, Keith keeps his quiet. For the first time since Shiro has known him, his nudity makes him seem vulnerable. Or maybe it's not the nudity at all.

When Keith speaks his tone is sober, matter-of-fact.

“I like it when you fuck me,” he reveals what Shiro had already known with certainty, “I like it when you choke me and hold me down and call me names.”

“Yes,” Shiro nods because he had known that already, “But do you like me?”

“Well, I wouldn't let anyone else do it, would I?”

Shiro cocks an eyebrow, “Is that a confession I hear?”

“Pff,” Keith snorts, “You're delusional.”

It's less of a conscious decision and more of an instinct when Shiro closes his fingers around Keith's wrist and pulls at him till he's got him laid across his lap. Keith's erection, slightly wilted from before, presses against Shiro's thigh. Shiro's own cock gives an interested twitch.

“What-,” Keith complains. He tries to push himself up, but Shiro holds him down, his Galran hand cupped around the back of Keith's neck in a soothing manner.

“I want a straight answer out of you,” Shiro tells him, “I won't let you go before that.”

“The fuck?” Keith says and then yelps in surprise when Shiro's other hand comes down hard on his buttocks.

“ _Spanking_?” he asks incredulously when he has caught himself again, “Seriously?”

“We can't let things become too repetitive,” Shiro muses idly because, quite honestly, he is slowly but surely running out of things he hasn't yet done to Keith. He wouldn't want their sex life to become predictable and mediocre.

His hand comes down again and again. He lets a few moments pass between each strike, just to really let Keith feel how much it smarts. Soon, his own palm tingles from the repeated impact and he quickly flexes his fingers before striking again. He spaces it out, makes sure to hit both Keith's ass cheeks and the back of his thighs.

“So?” Shiro asks when Keith has grown suspiciously quiet, “Got anything to say?”

He expects a curse or a barb. What he gets instead is a sob.

Shiro jolts.

“Keith?” he asks.

“Don't stop,” Keith says. He's letting his hand hang so Shiro cannot see his face but his voice sounds slightly strangled.

Shiro can practically feel his own pupils dilate as arousal whips through him. He lets his hand fly down and the sound of skin slapping against skin seems to hover in the air for a moment. He swallows, does it again.

A small helpless moan escapes Keith. Shiro smooths his palm over the sore buttocks and watches as a shiver snakes down Keith's spine. He slaps him again.

“Ah,” Keith's fingers grapple for purchase, close around Shiro's ankle, tighten their hold. The next slap makes his hips buck helplessly.

“Shiro,” he gasps, his breath hitching. It is the first time he has called him by his true name. And, in a way, it's a flag of surrender.

“Come,” Shiro says and, for the last time, lets his hand fall down like a guillotine.

Keith comes. With a choked off moan he writhes and comes all across Shiro lap. His back curves with the force of it, but then Shiro is already pulling him up by the hair, forcing him to look at him.

Keith's cheeks are swollen with salt, his eyelashes damp as he tries to avoid Shiro's searching gaze.

Curiosity laps at Shiro and he finds himself strangely pleased, even more so than after their usual encounter. To think that Galrans were capable of tears. Or was that merely Keith's human side?

He cannot know. He cannot ask either. Keith is beyond questions now, his body caving in on itself as he slumps against Shiro's chest.

He gets like this sometimes, completely useless after a particularly intense fuck, becomes more receptive of Shiro's more tender touches, and that pleases Shiro, too.

He maneuvers Keith around until he's got him laid down on the mattress. Then he uses Keith's discarded shirt to wipe off the worst of the mess. Keith shudders under him.

“You did so well,” Shiro tells him, even though he is not quite sure what he is referring to.

A half-formed noise escapes Keith, nowhere near a word, but he nudges his head into Shiro's hand, as much permission as he's gonna get.

He massages his way down along Keith's back, rubs at his shoulder blades and vertebrae. The skin of Keith's ass is radiating heat and, when he dips the tip of his finger into the still wet hole, Keith sucks in a breath.

It's not quite how Shiro had imagined this evening would go, but he supposes that doesn't mean that it went badly.

 

When Shiro wakes up, the first moment finds him disoriented. Panic slams into him, purely out of habit, because on the Galran ship-

But he's not on the Galran ship. He is in the Castle of Lion and, apparently, in Keith's bed with Keith himself securely nestled in his arms.

It shouldn't be as much of a shock as it is. They'd fucked countless of times but Shiro had always been sent back to his cell right after. Keith did not welcome overnight company. But Shiro was his gaoler now and he made the rules.

It had still been an accident and he cannot believe how careless he had been. The door, after all, was still unlocked, meaning Keith could have escaped at any given moment. It's been a while since Shiro had slept this deeply.

He wonders whether Keith knew that. Whether he had seen a plan for escape right there and chosen not to take it. Whether him staying was more than just a coincidence or a convenience.

He cannot tell if Keith is awake yet, but it makes little difference either way. Shiro just buries his nose against the nape of Keith's neck and tries to slow down the morning.

 

He calls in a somewhat unofficial meeting. He wish he could just casually do it on the side, but he needs an excuse to get Keith out of his room and into the common area.

As it is, Keith is sitting on one end of the couch while Hunk, Pidge and Lance sit on the other. It's difficult to figure out who decided no that arrangement, but he wouldn't be surprised if it was based on a mutual understanding that they did not want to get close to each other. Maybe this was going to be harder than expected.

Fortunately, Shiro finds himself backed up by Allura and Coran at his sides, both of them supporting his intention, even though for other reasons.

“What's up, boss?” Lance asks, forcefully lackadaisical. He can probably tell that something big is about to happen but does not want to let it get to him.

“I just have an announcement to make,” Shiro says, watching the strained expectation on everyone's faces, “Don't worry, it's nothing bad.”

He clears his throat and then squashes down his hesitation.

“I have talked to the princess,” he reveals, “And we have decided that we will no longer treat Keith as a prisoner.”

The confusion from the team is palpable, even if no one is openly protesting. But that doesn't last for long.

“But but but-,” Hunk says, just as Pidge pushes herself up from where she had almost slipped into the abyss between the sofa cushions. “What does that even mean?”

“We will no longer lock him into his room. We will no longer supervise him wherever he goes. We will let him leave the castle and, if the need arises, allow him to go on solo missions.”

Ironically, the one who must be most surprised is Keith, even if he does not show it. His face is carefully controlled, but his arms are defensively crossed in front of his chest.

“Er,” Lance says, side-eyeing Keith before very pointedly looking back not at Shiro but at Allura, “Is that a good idea?”

“I understand your reluctance,” Allura allows, her lips pursed, “I too was not easily convinced when Shiro brought this request to me.”

Because all they must see is Shiro being enthralled by Keith's wiles, a Galran ploy to gain unobstructed access to the castle and the lions. And Shiro understands why they would be suspicious, knows he himself would be, but he also knows that this is how it ought to be. They call themselves Defenders of the Universe and keep a slave of their own, just because he was useful.

They had to do more than just tolerate Keith. They had to accept him and his heritage and his hotheadedness.

“If we can trust him in battle, then we should trust him in our home base,” Shiro explains resolutely, “Not to mention that he is half-human.”

It was a question of nature versus nurture and then some. Would Keith's Terran genes win out against his Galran ones? Would the friendship and respect that he was promised here whittle away at the harsh exterior he had to developed as a part of Zarkon's fleet and family? Only time would tell, but for now someone had to make the first step.

“You're insane.”

Surprisingly – or unsurprisingly, because Shiro really should have expected it – it is Keith who says that.

“I could kill you in your sleep,” Keith tells him. He says it dangerously, but for once his teeth are not bared.

“You could have,” Shiro agrees meaningfully, “But you didn't.”

He can feel the others' eyes on them then, how they must be aware of how there is something else going on between them.

But let them. Secrets were not meant for this team and trust was not a one-way street. If he wanted them to respect Keith as a fellow paladin, they also needed to respect him as Shiro's lover.

“Well, fine by me,” Lance says, still somewhat reluctant, “As long as he does not try to usurp my reputation as the best pilot of this crew.”

“Yesterday, you flew into a tree,” Keith points out scathingly

“Yeah, I did that on purpose, okay?” Lance claims, “The tree was obstructing my view of the sun.”

“There were three suns on that desert planet,” Keith reminds him and then the two are glaring at each other again.

“I don't like this,” Pidge admits, his face dark, “But I trust Shiro's judgment.”

“Same,” Hunk shrugs, “Keith ain't so bad.”

For a son of Zarkon, Shiro thinks, that is probably as close as a ringing endorsement as there will be.

“Thank you,” Shiro tells them. He glances back at Allura who still does not look all relaxed and Coran who smiles encouragingly.

“It is true that trusting people makes you more vulnerable,” Coran says, his hands neatly folded behind his back, “But it also makes you stronger. There is a reason King Alfor built five lions instead of just one.”

Alfor had still been betrayed by the former Black Paladin, a small sliver of doubt whispers into Shiro's ear. And yet he does not find himself disheartened.

Instead he walks over to the sofa and very deliberately sits down next to Keith. After a moment, Allura and Coran join them in the middle of the couch.

Everyone is still kind of stiff and, even when conversation picks up again, it is rather stilted. Then Lance cracks a stupid joke that gets Pidge riled up and the chatter starts anew. The corner of Shiro's mouth twitches. This might well be their new normal.

It occurs to him that while Pidge and Hunk and Lance had been teammates at the Garrison for a couple of months now, he and Keith have known each other for a similar amount of time. They are still separate, but they will grow closer together throughout all the trials and tribulations that yet lay ahead of them.

Subtly, he slides his arm around Keith's shoulders

Next to him, Keith, who had been still been guarded, snorts.

“That's a cheap move,” he says.

It's not, though. Instead it is the first time that them touching is not meant to initiate sex. The first time their hesitant signs of affection are not preceded by violence. And Keith does not move away.

To call what they are doing cuddling would be a little overzealous. But as the hour wears on and the conversations in the room lazily weave through the minutes, Shiro finds himself growing more and more relaxed.

Thoughtfully, he runs a hand through his hair, tugs at the strands falling into his eyes, prematurely bleached white from too much stress and fear.

“I used to be different, you know,” he says, almost to himself, “Before everything.”

“Different how?” Keith asks after a moment. If he is surprised by Shiro's blunt approach, he does not say it.

“Softer,” Shiro remembers, “Kinder.”

He kind of wishes Keith could have known him back as he was before Kerberos, carefree and eager and a little too loud when he laughed at his friends' jokes. But he also knows that Keith and that old Shiro would never have meshed as well.

Keith lowers his head and plays with his fingers, contemplating the purple skin and sharp claws and everything that comes with it.

“I have always been this,” he knows.

“Doesn't mean you can't change,” Shiro tells him.

“What if I don't want to change?”

“What if you already have?”

“Why do you always have to be so cryptic?”

“Why do you always have to be so contrary?”

Keith growls lowly.

“Keith,” Shiro says, “Shut up.”

The order itself is familiar enough between them but Shiro dulls the usual edge to an teasing glint, more playful than threatening.

Keith obeys anyway. It might have something to do with how Shiro then leans in and kisses him, but for now he lets it slide. Keith will probably complain later anyway.

There are still many things unspoken. But the universe won't be won in a blink. Eventually, they'll get there.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I really hope Shiro's thought processes came across as something that made even a lick of sense. I think his relationship with Keith is is extremely complex and neither of them fully understands it yet. 
> 
> Technically, I could let it end here, but I am also interested how things might progress from this point on, for example Keith really gaining the trust of the others, running into Lotor at some point, maybe being taken capitve. Shiro freaking out. You know. The good shit.
> 
> Please let me know what you think and what you might like to see. I love gathering inspiration in whatever manner possible!


End file.
